We count
on scientists to tell us what they know and do not know " not just what
they want us to hear. But when it comes to the origin and evolution
of life on earth, some spokesmen for official science are less forthcoming
than we might wish.

When writing
in scientific journals, leading biologists candidly discuss the many
scientific difficulties facing contemporary versions of Darwin's theory.
Yet when those same scientists take up the public defense of Darwinism
in educational policy statements or public television documentaries,
that candor often disappears behind a rhetorical curtain. "There's a
feeling in biology that scientists should keep their dirty laundry hidden,"
says theoretical biologist Danny Hillis, adding that "there's a strong
school of thought in biology that one should never question Darwin in
public."

Nowhere
is this uncritical public allegiance to Darwinism more evident than
in PBS's current eight-hour, Paul Allen-funded documentary series titled
"Evolution." PBS states that the series is simply "solid science journalism"
about a theory supported by "all known scientific evidence," which "does
not challenge religious beliefs." To make this case, however, Evolution's
producers have erected the journalistic equivalent of a Potemkin village
where awkward puzzles are omitted, scientific dissent is kept out of
sight and history has been artfully rearranged.

"Evolution"
makes a very selective presentation of the scientific evidence. For
example, the series repeatedly offers evidence of minor variations in
organisms such as the emergence of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria
as support for Darwinism. Yet Darwin proposed that natural selection
could produce not only minor changes like those now observed in bacteria,
but also the major structural innovations in the history of life.

Few biologists
dispute that natural selection produces small-scale "micro-evolutionary"
changes such as those in the size and shape of Galapagos finch beaks
(also featured in the series). But many now doubt that the Darwinian
mechanism explains the large-scale "macro-evolutionary" innovations
necessary to build new organisms (such as birds) in the first place.
Thus, developmental biologist Scott Gilbert of Swarthmore University
argues that "natural selection explains the survival, but not the arrival
of the fittest."

Yet, "Evolution"
gives no voice to such doubts. Worse, it makes numerous factual errors
that exaggerate the evidential support for Darwinism. The series asserts
that the universality of the genetic code establishes that all organisms
had a common ancestor. But biologists have known for well over a decade
that the genetic code is not universal. Brown University biologist Kenneth
Miller asserts that the "imperfect" wiring of the vertebrate retina
proves that natural selection, not an intelligent designer, produced
the eye. God, in Miller's opinion, wouldn't have done it that way. To
arrange the retina as Miller thinks best, however, would render it inoperative.
The series leaves the distinct impression that a computer program has
successfully simulated the evolution of the eye. But such a program
nowhere exists " a fact recently verified by Professor Dan Nilsson (of
Lund University in Sweden), the very expert that PBS interviewed about
eye evolution.

It's hard
to believe that PBS's scientific advisers didn't know about some of
these factual problems or, at least, about other scientists who could
have provided informed dissenting opinion. There are many such scientists.

This week,
100 scientists, including professors from institutions such as M.I.T,
Yale and Rice, issued a statement questioning the creative power of
natural selection.

But airing
scientific dissent would have complicated PBS's message. In the world
according to "Evolution," reasonable, scientifically-literate people
accept Darwinism without qualification. Only benighted religious fundamentalists
dissent.

"Evolution,"
despite its claims to the contrary, is very much concerned with religion
" though its message about it at first seems contradictory. In the first
episode Stephen Gould says that "Darwin didn't oppose religion," but
then a docudrama about Darwin shows him doing exactly that. Ken Miller
says there is a "wonderful consistency" between evolution and Christianity
" a conclusion that Gould clearly doubts, and philosopher Daniel Dennett
explicitly denies. As Dennet explains, natural selection replaced the
creator as the cause of biological design. Yet, historian Jim Moore
asserts " as Darwin's image floats over the interior of Westminster
Abbey " that Darwin had "fundamentally a religious vision." The famous
closing paragraph of the Origin is read in creedal tones.

So what
gives? Is Darwinism compatible with religion, as the series claims,
or not? It all depends upon which type of religion " even which type
of Christianity " is under consideration. PBS's spokesmen for Darwinism
can accept religion that has accommodated itself to Darwinism and its
essential claim, namely, that undirected natural processes fully account
for the origin of the living world. Such religion may affirm the existence
of God, but only as a spectator of the Darwinian process that otherwise
performs the real work of creation. On the other hand, "Evolution" rejects
" even ridicules " traditional theistic religion because it holds that
God played an active (even discernable) role in the origin of life on
earth. In short, good religion accommodates Darwinism, bad religion
rejects it. But that implies, of course, that the real religion of this
series is Darwinism.

--

Stephen
Meyer, Ph.D. (history and philosophy of science, Cambridge University),
is an associate professor of philosophy at Whitworth College and director
of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.
Formerly a geophysicist with the Atlantic Richfield Company, Prof. Meyer
completed a Ph.D. dissertation on origin-of-life biology and the methodology
of the historical sciences. He has contributed to many technical journals
and scholarly books in the philosophy of science. In addition to technical
articles, Prof. Meyer has written many editorial features in newspapers
and magazines, including The Wall Street Journal, The L.A. Times, The
Chicago Tribune, First Things and National Review. He has recently appeared
on several national television programs including HardBall with Chris
Matthews (CNBC), Freedom Speaks (PBS), TechnoPolitics (PBS), Fox TV
News with David Asman and NPR's Talk of the Nation with Ray Suarez.
He has also recently testified about the biological origins controversy
before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He is a co-author of the
book "Science and Evidence of Design in the Universe" (Ignatius, 2000).